Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Sis' Dirt Pile

One day my husband's sister (Sis) decided that she wanted one of those tractor tire flower planters in her front yard...to cover an old stump. She located a rubber tractor tire somewhere and placed it smack dab in the middle of her front yard. She couldn't plant any flowers in it until she filled it with some good dirt...all she needed was about 5 or 6, five-gallon buckets full of good topsoil or compost.

Instead of making a quick trip to the local garden center for a few bags of soil...she decided she would call the guy who hauls dirt by the truck-load. She asked him how much it would cost for a half a load of dirt and he told her it would cost the same as a full load.

Wanting to get her money's worth, she said she'd take the full load. He cautioned her...that a full dump-truck load of dirt, was a lot of dirt...but she said, "Bring it anyway and dump it in the tire...you can't miss it...it's in the front yard."

Mind you, this guy had a big dump truck and he dumped the dirt right where she had asked him to. Covered with a massive mound of dirt, the tire plantar was buried and wasn't seen for a month. Sis kept the mound covered with a huge tarp to keep the rain from turning her front yard into a giant mud puddle when it rained. She offered free dirt to anyone she saw and if they accepted her gift...she would even help load it into their containers, wheel-barrels, buckets or truck beds.

Sis is 78 years young and in the picture she is helping her brother shovel dirt into containers that are in the back of his jeep.

9 comments:

Alipurr said...

this is a very funny story...put a smile on my face. I hope she will have some beautiful flowers in the spring

LoriCloud said...

That is a funny story...can't blame her for wanting her moneys worth. It reminds me of the time my ex-husband decided to sod our front yard and had over 20 tons of dirt dumped in a pile. He said it needed to be spread out by evening in order to sod that night...then he left for work!

Sandy Hatcher-Wallace said...

Lori...your comment was funny...We also had dirt dumped and it certainly took more than a day to spread it out by hand.

It was fun though...because we invited people over and then had a cookout for the helpers. I, like yourself, will use any excuse to have a party.

Gil said...

Sounds exactly like one of our project here at RR.

bornfool said...

lol. I think I would have just bought a few bags of topsoil.

Judypatooote said...

Funny, I feel for Sis...once I ordered a 1/2 ton in a bag....they delivered and dumped the huge bag at the end of my driveway.... I thought this is cool, I can use the dirt when needed...it was spring.....well trying to get the dirt out of the bag was hard enough, and one day I went out opened the bag to foot high weeds. Oh yeah, they were plentiful.....I called the place, and they told me that they would send someone out to weed them if I wanted....ha, no thank you I want a refund...you can have the dirt back.....well they did give me a refund, and let me keep the dirt....hooray....so now I had free dirt but I had to weed it, and find a place for it....dumped it by the grapevines......so don't ever order 1/2 ton of dirt in the bag... you can't move it, and it is a weed garden......

somershade said...

I have a dirt story, but it's not funny so I won't share it. Dad once dug out, wait that's a dig story,oh well.
I liked the husband left for work story that was funny.Lorischuster now we know why he is your ex

Motherkitty said...

I have several areas in our yard where either dirt or rocks were delivered (once or several times) and these areas have become mini-mounds where grass eventually grew over them. We occasionally dig some dirt or rocks up to fill a hole in the yard but they basically stay mini-mounds like some ancient Indian burial mounds. Maybe some archeologist will try to excavate them in the future to see if some treasure was buried under these mounds.

Jellyhead said...

Ah, what a funny story! Sounds like the kind of thing my hubby would do.